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What's a Wreck?

A Cake Wreck is any cake that is unintentionally sad, silly, creepy, inappropriate - you name it. A Wreck is not necessarily a poorly-made cake; it's simply one I find funny, for any of a number of reasons. Anyone who has ever smeared frosting on a baked good has made a Wreck at one time or another, so I'm not here to vilify decorators: Cake Wrecks is just about finding the funny in unexpected, sugar-filled places.

I'm told that today is National Cupcake Day. So, we could celebrate all that's good about these mini-cakes in paper wrappers, and look at beautiful examples of them made by talented people...

OR

We could take a little refresher course on why Cupcake Cakes are evil. After all, what better way to celebrate the cupcake than by protecting it from unholy perversions which must be stopped before cake art as we know it is ruined beyond all saving!?!

[patting down hair]

Yeah, I like Option B better, too.

There are two types of CCCs: your basic, all-slathered-together model:

(which Wreckerators are forever trying to make round shapes out of)

And the "mosaic" style, wherein the cupcakes are each iced separately:

(Either a crying fish or an airplane turned sideways, dumping out the pilot's lunch.)

As you can see, both types of CCC are what baking industry insiders refer to as "fugly."

Plus, cupcake cakes come with enough frosting to induce a diabetic coma merely by being within a ten-foot radius. Usually we're spared this sight because CCC photos are taken from directly overhead, but you can sort of see what I'm talking about here:

What's worse: that this is supposed to be a sombrero, or that there's even more icing underneath those paper wrappers, gluing them to the board?

CCCs almost always result in shapes that baffle the imagination. If you wanted to put that in a positive light (which I don't) you could say they're like edible Rorschach tests (so I won't). And so one person's hamburger becomes another's highway o' caterpillars: